Ing. Michal Otava is the Director of Purchasing and Investments at Dopravní podnik Ostrava a.s. (Transport Company Ostrava) and a member of the Board of Directors. The departments managed by him primarily prepare and create tender documentation for public contracts and prepare short-term and long-term investment plans. He has been a member of the Transport Company Ostrava management team for three years now.
Transport Company Ostrava is the introduction of modern technologies. So what exactly can your passengers look forward to?
Anti-collision, assistance and camera systems in our vehicles are now standard for our passengers, and we can offer them at the most modern level thanks to the efforts of the team at Transport Company Ostrava (DPO). Above all, we want safety and comfort for our passengers, and these are our priorities. Alongside this, of course, is reliability. For example, we are currently preparing tender documentation for a public contract to measure the load factor of connections to respond even more accurately to changes in demand from our passengers. We now have a measurement system that works in cooperation with our drivers. They use a button on the onboard system to send data on the load factor at a certain point. The data is then averaged over a specific period. However, we are inspired by the system used, for example, in public transport vehicles in Vienna. They have a device above each door that can count passengers much more accurately – up to 98% accuracy. We need that too. So we will demand a much more accurate system.
You are a municipal company that enjoys mutually beneficial relationships with partners and suppliers. Does electronic purchasing fulfil this principle for you?
First of all, we are a company that is open to discussion with all partners and suppliers. There is no other way to compete in DPO today than through an electronic purchasing portal, and this makes us as transparent as possible. Transparency is something that we pride ourselves on, and I am pleased that in the last three years that I have been able to work on this topic with my team at DPO, we have had measurable results. Today, companies trust us and are not afraid to enter our tender competitions. It is very important for us that the credibility of the supplier market is growing. Not so long ago, there was an average of one and a half bids per tender; today there are three. The European trend is around four. As a transport company, we have specific suppliers and a narrow profile of companies, so we are satisfi ed with an average of over three bids per tender. But of course we would like to achieve the European trend.
Your company is a leader in modernising and greening transport. Can you tell us what interesting purchases of transport equipment are in store for you in the future?
We are currently holding a tender competition for the supply of hydrogen buses. This is a big topic for us right now. In a way, we are also pioneers in it. For example, it took us a year of work to prepare the tender documents. We spent several months with the purchasing and investments team to carefully determine the market situation. We have a tender submission at the end of June. We are now curious to see how the price will turn out and how many bidders will come forward. We have about 150 public contracts a year in the DPO. A team of five people prepares the tender documents for the tenders. They do a great job in cooperation with the specialist departments, and I thank them for that. What else awaits us? In mid-2022, large-capacity ForCity Smart trams from Škoda Transportation should be running through Ostrava. At the moment, we have ordered 35 vehicles. And in the foreseeable future… We know that in 2024 and 2025, the large- capacity KT8 trams will reach the end of their service life. So our objective will soon be their replacement.
Thank you for the interview.
Text: redakce
Foto: archiv DPO
